DIY Paint Chips Advent Calendar

It's been more and more difficult lately to pause what we're doing and come back to why we're doing some things, especially with all the holiday preparations, decorating, and gift-buying. I really wanted to be more "intentional" at least in some aspects and so I thought this kind of Advent calendar would be a helpful one in that regard.

Instead of giving or receiving toys or chocolate, I propose to do one simple yet meaningful activity each day. You might want to donate old things, or buy coffee for the person behind you at Starbucks, or simply spend quality time with your person and not look at your phone every five minutes (guilty!).

02. Cut out the triangles and write a meaningful activity for each day.

03. Using the triangles as a guide, cut out the exact same shape from the paint chips. Feel free to position them vertically, horizontally, or diagonally (as shown in the photo below).

The idea is to have a variety of patterns as trees. Also, the paint chips I had were the larger sized ones so I was able to cut out two triangles from one chip.

04. Using double sided tape, stick the paper triangle (with writing) to the back of the paint chip triangle.

05. Take the wooden dowels and glue them side-by-side onto the center of the cardboard.

06. Within the 1/2 inch outer edge of cardboard, glue the garland all around.

07. Finally, insert your paint chip trees between the wooden dowels.

There you go! Easy, right?

In case you saw the sneak peak on Instagram, this wasn't how I first intended it to turn out.

I was supposed to create a kind of wreath mobile with each of the 24 little trees neatly taped and hung on individual strings that form a downward opening spiral, that ideally would be shaped like a big tree.

Yeah. That would've been too tedious.

Fortunately, this is an alternative where you only need to basically cut, stick, and insert!

I'm curious as to what activities people come up with during this time of year. What's the most fun activity you've done or heard of? What's the weirdest or most unique? Share in the comments below!

See you again next week for two back-to-back DIYs — holiday cards and gift wrapping projects!